Tag Archives: Social issues

NYC passengers get ‘ride to remember’

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By MYLES VALENTINE

NYC passengers riding the A train Tuesday were on their way to Manhattan when the train came off its tracks, crashed into a subway wall and caught on fire around 125th Street.

Passengers reportedly said they were stuck on the train, which was quickly filling with smoke, for 20 minutes before help arrived. Some passengers had asthma and some were pregnant. Passengers took to Twitter using hashtags like #FixTheSubway to let alert New York Metropolitan Transportation Authority of the situation.

The loss of power underground halted the A, B, C, and D train service at 125th Street, causing an uproar by riders. Apparently the MTA isn’t new to screwing up with subway service because one customer had this to say: “Yet again @MTA, ‘Going Your Way’ is exactly what you DON’T do… But please, take more of our time & money.”

Passengers on the smoke filled A train were eventually evacuated and had to walk through the subway tunnels to exit. No serious injuries were reported. More information on the story should be emerging soon.

High court takes wedding cake case

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By ALEJANDRO GRANDA

The U.S. Supreme Court said it will take on the case of a Denver baker, Jack Phillips, owner of Masterpiece Cakeshop, who refused to sell a wedding to cake to gay couple David Mullins and Charlie Craig in 2012 and decide whether or not he unlawfully discriminated against them.

Lower courts believe that Phillips had violated the Colorado’s public accommodations law that prohibits refusing service to customers based on race, sex, marital status and sexual orientation.

He said he refused to sell them a wedding cake because his religious beliefs would not allow him to have anything to do with same-sex marriage, apparently including making a cake for them.

The couple then filed a complaint and the Colorado Civil Rights Commission determined in 2014 that Phillips did violate state law. Now, it is in the hands of the U.S. Supreme Court to decide whether Phillips did in fact do that.

The Washington Post does a great job reporting this news, providing support with many other cases where a business refused service to same-sex couples and finding little success in courts, ruling that public businesses must comply with state anti-discrimination laws, which will probably and hopefully be the outcome in this case as well.

Bullet aimed at pit bull kills teen

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By ALEJANDRO GRANDA

A teen, 17-year-old Armando Garcia-Muro, was fatally shot Friday morning when two deputies opened fire at a pit bull and one of the bullets bounced on the concrete, hitting him in the chest in Palmdale, Calif.

The pit bull survived the shooting, but was later euthanized.

Roberta Alcantar, the teen’s mother, said he was “a very loving person” who loved dogs and planned to go into construction after finishing high school this upcoming year.

The deputies had first been called to the Palmdale complex at about 3:45 a.m., responding to noise complains of a loud party.

Garcia-Muro helped restrain the dog in the back of his apartment complex after it first charged the group of deputies and bit one of them. But then the dog broke loose and charged again, which was when deputies shot and wounded the pit bull about 10 feet away and then chased it as it tried to run to the back of the building.

That was when they saw the boy about 30 to 40 feet away, who was hit in the chest by a bullet ricocheted off the concrete, calling it a “skip round.”

He died an hour later in the hospital

NBCNews did a great job reporting the horrible tragedy that occurred that morning, but should have mentioned when the dog had attacked.

Is there a future for nuclear energy?

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By NOELIA GRAHAM

In the 1950s, nuclear energy was all the rage, promising to supply the world all of it’s energy. With the passing of time however, nuclear energy has faded from innovative to cumbersome.

Nuclear energy is costly, dangerous, and powerful. As the world looks to cleaner sources of energy, what does this hold for the future of nuclear energy?

Several large-scale incidents have paved the way for nuclear energy way out, including the incident at Chernobyl in 1986 and more recently Fukushima’s nuclear accident in 2011.

Mostly likely as a result of the disaster in Fukushima, Germany decided to phase out nuclear power altogether by 2022.

Also, South Korea, which invested many years into its nuclear energy technology will be scaling back in their nuclear energy consumption and released a plan called the “One Less Nuclear Power Plant” initiative one year after the incident in Fukushima.

Public opinion about the reliability of nuclear energy has tanked, putting politicians and world leaders in the midst to figure out what to do next. But it’s more than just public opinion, keeping nuclear energy around has a lot to do with economics.

While nuclear energy in the United States does offer some benefits, it’s too expensive to maintain when you take into account all of the money spent in making sure it’s done safely.

“You can make it go fast, and you can make it be cheap — but not if you adhere to the standard of care that we do,” said Mark Cooper of the Institute for Energy and the Environment at Vermont Law School, referring to the United States regulatory body. “Nuclear safety always undermines nuclear economics. Inherently, it’s a technology whose time never comes.”

Harvey jokes about Flint water crisis

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By MYLES VALENTINE

Steve Harvey has become the talk of the town once again, this time for his insensitive jokes about the Flint, Mich., water crisis.

Flint, as you probably know, has now surpassed its 1,000th day without clean water. Flint’s residents to this day still have to use bottled water for everything from drinking, to cooking, and even bathing.

After the Cleveland Cavaliers lost the NBA championship, a caller, from Flint, made a comment on Harvey’s national radio show. The caller supposedly said that the Cavaliers “didn’t deserve jack.” Harvey — a Cavaliers fan — didn’t appreciate the caller’s comments and responded by saying “That’s why y’all ain’t even got clean water.” He continued with “When was the last time you touched water and it didn’t have lead in it?” The co-hosts of the radio show gasped and followed with laughter. Harvey then ended his rant by saying “enjoy your nice brown glass of water.”

Harvey has been under fire from critics on Twitter about his insensitive comments and it is said that the city’s mayor, Karen Weaver, who has appeared on Harvey’s show to discuss the crisis in the past, wants an apology from Harvey. Harvey insists the comments were just trash talk and not malicious.

Muslim teenager’s death not hate crime

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By ISAIAH TAYLOR

A group of teenagers observing Ramadan traveled from the All Dulles Area Muslim Society mosque in Virginia to a local McDonald’s at around 3 a.m. on Sunday. As they left, the fast food restaurant on bikes or on foot, a car appeared behind them.

After getting into a verbal altercation with one of the teenagers, the driver, believed to be 22-year-old Darwin Martinez Torres, drove his car over a curb towards the group.

The teenagers continued on their way, but were later met by the same man who allegedly chased them with a baseball bat, hitting Nabra Hassanen before taking her into his car and leaving.

Police units from two counties, a helicopter, and search dogs banded together before 5 in the morning. A car was seen returning multiple times to where Nabra had been abducted, and the driver, Martinez Torres, was arrested. The 17-year-old Nabra was later found dead near the suspect’s apartment building.

Although officers in Fairfax are unsure about the motivation behind the seemingly random murder, they have stated that it was probably a road rage incident. However, Nabra Hassanen’s family believes otherwise. Her father, Mohmoud Hassanen, declared that the attack must have been due to religion, explaining that the suspect knew nothing of Nabra except that she was wearing Islamic clothing, yet still chose to target her.

Darwin Martinez Torres also has family members defending him. He is a construction worker and the father to a four-year-old son. An aunt of his stated that his whole family is confused about the charges, and see him as a nice man. Martinez Torres was also said to be at a park with his mother just hours before the kidnapping of Nabra Hassanen.

​Outraged citizens have spoken up on social media about the death, arguing that it was a hate crime and cannot be justified as road rage because the teenagers were pedestrians. The incident also came at a similar time to a terrorist attack outside of a mosque in London, injuring 10 persons. One post on social media cites four different crimes from the past weekend, with the caption, “Hate has devastating consequences.”

Madrid cracks down on ‘manspreading’

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By GABRIELA SANTOS

Madrid, the Spanish capital, will begin to place signs on city buses that will prohibit “manspreading.” Much like those already in place that do not allow smoking or littering.

Manspreading is the practice whereby a man, especially one traveling on public transport, adopts a sitting position with his legs wide apart, in such a way as to encroach on an adjacent seat or seats, as defined by the Oxford Dictionary.

Cities around the world, like New York and Philadelphia, have been adopting these kind of campaigns to dissuade riders from practicing the careless behavior.

“The mission of this new signage is to remember the need to maintain civic behavior and to respect the space of everyone on board the bus,” Spanish bus operator EMT said in a statement this week.

The decision came after a Spanish feminist group called “Mujeres en Lucha” created a petition that garnered more than 600 signatures on the popular site Change.org. They also created the hashtag #MadridSinManspreading (MadridWithoutManspreading) to help spread the message.

Manspreading “is not something that occurs sporadically, but if you look, you will realize that it is a very common practice,” the petition read. “It is not difficult to see women with their legs closed and very uncomfortable because there is a man next to her who is invading her space with his legs.”

Transport officials in Madrid also plan to use this campaign for the city’s metro system, according to BBC News.

The term “manspreading” has become a worldwide phenomenon and has led to many men being called out via social media. So much so that the Oxford Dictionary entered it into their online dictionary in 2015.

The practice has become so commonplace that most perpetrators don’t even realize that they’re doing it- and if they do they certainly don’t care. Hence, the new campaign to put a stop to it.

News media outlets have maintained a pretty good level on non-bias reporting on this topic, which surprisingly has been reported on by most top sites.

This is just one of those issues that is non-partisan, because after all, how can you be mad at people just trying to make the world more polite?

Girlfriend sends chilling text in suicide

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By NEYDJA PETITHOMME

After the life-ending tragedy of Conrad Roy III in July 2014, who inhaled carbon monoxide in his pickup truck, Samantha Boardman, friend, said she received a gruesome text message from Roy’s girlfriend.

According to CNN, Michelle Carter, 17, Roy’s girlfriend, said “He got out of the car because it was working and he got scared and I f—–g told him to get back in.”

“Is there any way a portable generator can kill you somehow?” the message said.

“Because he said he was getting that and some other tools at the store.”

Later, Carter allegedly wrote, “No more pushing it off,” “No more waiting.”

During the time of death on July 13, 2014, Roy was found dead in a Kmart parking lot in Fairhaven, Mass., approximately 40 miles from his home. Roy was wearing a blue T-shirt, shorts and sunglasses, during the time of the scene.

Text messages, such as this, are absurdly difficult to bypass. Carter’s words speak just as loudly as her actions. We cannot say someone did or did not say or do anything, but her words are in black in white, but then again, without physical proof/evidence, Carter is innocent till proven guilty.

According to Carter, “He seemed fine,” she said.

Roy, Conrad’s mother, said she exchanged messages with Carter following her son’s death and mentioned that Carter said she had not been in touch with Conrad on the day of his death. Officials need to investigate Carter’s alibi and focus on the primary concerns of where Carter was during the time of Roy’s death, who she spoke with on the day of his death. The alibis of the affiliates of who Carter was with also need to be investigated.

Harvard rescinds 10 admit decisions

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By GABRIELA SANTOS

Harvard University has chosen to rescind acceptance offers from 10 incoming freshman after becoming aware of an offshoot face group aimed at sharing “offensive” memes.

School administrators moderate an official Harvard Class of 2021 Facebook group in an effort to create a place for new students to get to know each other beforehand and ask questions in preparation for their first semester

Everything began when about 100 students created a separate page to share memes with one another – a trend amongst elite colleges. The page was entitled “Harvard memes for horny bourgeois teens.”

According to the Harvard Crimson, the school’s daily newspaper, the whole exchange took a dark turn when members of this group formed a spin-off page where students could exchange “R-rated” memes.

The founders of the group required that students posted questionable memes on the main page to gain admittance. Otherwise, the page is completely private.

The memes and images that were shared in the private group ranged from offensive racial stereotypes to the deaths of children, according the images provided by The Crimson. When university officials became aware of what was going on they took immediate action.

Harvard reserves the right to withdraw an offer of admission if the admitted student “engages or has engaged in behavior that brings into question their honesty, maturity or moral character,” among other conditions, Rachel Dane, a Harvard spokeswoman, told The Washington Post.

This reaction brings to light a whole new issue that has been growing in recent years – that social media is playing a large role in the university admissions process.

The reoccurring question seems to be that at which point does this violate freedom of expression?

Erica Goldberg, an assistant professor at Ohio Northern law school, which said she taught at Harvard Law School for three years, stated that this page was no different than the popular game Cards Against Humanity, “whose purpose is to be as clearly offensive as possible”.

The group – which garnered more than 30,000 members, including “pharmabro” Martin Shkreli – seems to clearly be aimed at poking fun at these topics and not necessarily supporting these sentiments.

News media coverage of this topic has mainly focused on how this offensive material undermines the current “PC” culture at universities nationwide. The problem with reporting on these topics is, in fact, that it is done by older adults who unfortunately don’t understand the irreverent humor.

The headlines repeatedly use words like “hateful” and “racist” to describe the pages but they fail to recognize that the whole point of these memes is to not embrace these ideals but to laugh at the absurdity that anyone could actually believe these kinds of things.

Instead of demonizing these teens for their jokes, perhaps the news media should be focusing more on how appropriate it is that they are being reprimanded for conversations made in private.

Tulsa officer receives $35,000 back pay

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By MYLES VALENTINE

Tulsa police officer Betty Shelby was acquitted of manslaughter after fatally shooting an unarmed black man, Terrence Crutcher, back in September. It’s been less than a week since she’s been cleared and she’ll reportedly return to work and receive back pay.

Why would Betty Shelby be receiving $35,000?

The deadly encounter started when Crutcher’s SUV broke down on Sept. 16, 2016. Two other drivers called 911, they were reporting a man running away from the SUV and saying it was going to blow up.

Police helicopter footage later showed Crutcher with his hands in the air as he walked toward his broken-down SUV.

This is were it gets a little bit iffy. As Crutcher nears the driver’s side door, part of the camera’s view is blocked. By the end of the video, Crutcher is on the ground with a large bloodstain on the front of his T-shirt.

Shelby testified that she called for backup and ordered Crutcher to get on his knees.

Crutcher ignored her order and also ignored orders from her and another officer, Tyler Turnbough, who arrived on the scene, Shelby said.

She said Crutcher put his hands on the SUV and then moved to reach into the vehicle. Shelby fired one shot from her weapon while Turnbough fired his Taser, she testified.

An attorney for Crutcher’s family has said that Crutcher’s window was rolled up, making it unlikely he was reaching in it. After everything Officer Shelby was charged by the district attorney’s office six days later.

The incident was caught on police helicopter video and a dashboard camera and footage from the shooting was released later, triggering protests as the latest in a high-profile string of unarmed police shootings in recent years.

According to Tulsa spokeswoman Michelle Brooks, Shelby has been on unpaid leave since Sept. 22 and will be taking home about $35,000 in back pay.

Tulsa Police Chief Chuck Jordan said Shelby will not be working in a patrol capacity, so in other words… she will be working at a desk.

’13 Reasons Why’ addresses teen issues

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By CHANTAL ALBA

Netflix released its new original series “13 Reasons Why” last Friday and, yes, I binge-watched it. The series is based on the best-selling book by Jay Asher, which follows around Clay Jensen and his quest to uncover the truth about why his friend and crush, Hannah Baker, committed suicide.

The series starts off with Clay coming home to a mysterious box with his name on it. Inside the box, are cassette tapes recorded by Hannah leaving detailed stories dedicated to specific people about why she decided to take her life. If you haven’t watched it yet, I highly recommend that you do. It’s a great show and will definitely pull at your heart strings with its intense emotional content.

Personally, I think this series is great and I’m glad it’s generating a lot of buzz because it sheds a lot of light about the issues teenagers deal with everyday in high school. It gives you a real portrayal of how high school can be for some students. It shows just how bad things can get between bullying, friendships that end in betrayal, rumors, and loneliness. Basically all things that pushed Hannah to take her own life.

If you have a heart and soul, than you can definitely empathize with Hannah Baker’s tragic decision, and Clay’s need to try to make things right for her even though it is already too late.

This story shows that each of us need to hold ourselves accountable to being a good person, because we never know what a person is going through or how much they can take. I don’t want to give away anything for those who haven’t watched it, but this story can definitely serve as a fictional cautionary tale about why we need to treat others with kindness and respect.

Spring break begins in Florida

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By ALISON GOEBEL

As we all know, it is now the season for spring breakers to travel south and enjoy the nice, warm, blaring sunshine that we have.

But, it is also the time of the year where cops have to be in full force and bars, clubs and beaches all have to be prepared for the massive crowds that fill their territories.

Last year in Miami, there were several arrests due to fights breaking out and crowds in the thousands created chaos on Ocean Drive on South Beach.

The police ended up having to step in the middle of these giant crowds, making the scene take quite a bit to get under control.

This year, there were a lot of efforts that went into cracking down on alcohol, litter, loud music, and the safety of all of the people participating in spring break on South Beach.

This new ban includes no coolers, tents or inflatable devices on the beach.

Although all of these efforts were made in order to keep the peace, the police were still forced to shut down ocean drive this year for spring breakers too due to the crowds filling the sand and streets.

In Fort Lauderdale, it still is a great place for spring breakers, but it doesn’t seem as “ratchet” or too out of hand.

They have tents that are specifically stationed in the popular areas and four policemen on horses at each station.

There are also dozens of trash bags and bins all across the beach to try and keep the littering to a minimal.

Fort Lauderdale seems to have it a lot more under control than Miami, although Miami probably has a lot more people participating in such activities.

As far as the news coverage goes, I’d say that they do a very good job of informing people about issues such as these on a local level.

All of the news companies from Orlando to Daytona Beach to Miami have done a very good job covering all aspects of the “spring breakers” story, the only thing that I thought maybe was lacking was on the national level.

The national level, I think, does still apply to these types of stories because you have people coming from all over the country to Florida to be a part of drinking and partying on the beach.

International Women’s Day celebrated

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By CHANTAL ALBA

International Women’s Day is an annual commemoration of the women’s rights movement, that takes place every year on March 8. This year, women had many ways in which they celebrated.

Many women used it as a day of protest, to show why women are important in the world. They used it as a day of praise, to take the time to thank and lift each other up. They used it as a day to hold everyone, including themselves, accountable for the way women are treated in today’s society.

This International Women’s Day called for women to wear the color red. Why red? Wearing red was promoted by the same people who organized the Women’s March on Washington. They stated that they chose the color red for their new campaign because they see it as a “power” color and because it represents “revolutionary love and sacrifice”. The color is a “call to action” for human rights and justice, but to also raise awareness to the women’s right movement.

Many celebrities and politicians took to social media to show their support in the campaign including Salma Hayek, Kerry Washington, Emma Watson, Ellen DeGeneres and Hillary Clinton. Men like Mario Lopez, LeBron James, Jared Leto, and Pharrell Williams decided to join in on the movement and show their support for women.

With everything going on in our nation and around the world, Wednesday showed that the world is still full of people who want to show, give and receive love. It was a beautiful reminder why we must continue to fight the good fight.

Nike reveals ‘Pro Hijab’

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By ANDREA HUETE

In a nation that has become increasingly biased towards Muslims (I would say somewhat due to the new administration but, I digress), Nike is fighting back through product to show its support for athletes everywhere.

You may have heard of President Trump’s travel ban he implemented at the beginning of his administration. Many athletes were speaking up against this act of racism and bigotry, including Olympic medalist, Ibtihaj Muhammad, who was the first woman to ever compete for the USA wearing a Hijab.

Many companies in positions of power, have been asked where they stand on the entire situation regarding the election and the new president. Some have, some haven’t, and some are able to make it abundantly clear where they stand without actually saying a word.

Nike released a campaign on Feb. 17 that featured athletes from the Middle East and North Africa, tying into the Syrian refugee crisis. This new advertisement features strictly female athletes, and has a powerful message to women. The message also has an audio overlay of a woman speaking in Arabic. This specific advertisement now has over two million views.

Nike made their stance even more clear on Monday, releasing details on the new Pro Hijab. The Nike Pro Hijab is set for release in spring 2018 and has created a lot of buzz on social media. Nike stated that it has been working on the idea since 2012 when Sarah Attar represented Saudi Arabia in the Olympics.

People tend to follow companies that are in higher positions of power. Even though Nike is not the first company to include the idea of hijabs in sportswear, I’m excited that such a big corporation is stepping up to the plate to combat all the recent xenophobia. Hopefully more corporations will follow suit and the bigotry can be combated.

Baylor coach apologizes for comment

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By ERYKAH DAVENPORT

Back in January 2017, a lawsuit was filed by a former student that attended Baylor University. Allegedly, 31 different Baylor football players committed 52 “acts of rape” between 2011 and 2014, which was reported by CBS Sports.

After gaining a well-deserved win 500 over Texas Tech, Baylor women’s basketball coach Kim Mulkey made a comment that caused tremendous controversy. Reported by John Elizondo of ABC, Mulkey said this to the crowd in attendance at the Ferrell Center following Baylor’s win over Texas Tech: “If someone around you ever says I’ll never send my daughter to Baylor, you knock them right in the face.”

She has recently released an apology after comments made last week regarding the school’s sexual assault scandal. According to ESPN, Mulkey stated, “I’m sorry for those choice of words, timing wasn’t good, poor analogy as well, because if you know me, I’m an emotional person, coached and coached with emotion. It all got the best of me, because I love this place. A lot of bad things happened here, but I’ve always thought about the victims.”

Mulkey previously expressed regret for those comments in an interview with Mechelle Voepel of espnW.com Tuesday.

“I hate that I used the remark about punching them in the face,” Mulkey said. “That was not literal. I was trying to make a point, to be firm in what you are saying back at them. I’m not a violent person. I apologize for the very poor choice of words.”

Pope considers married men as priests

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By ISABELLA HALILI

Pope Francis has been known to be one of the more progressive popes that have lead the Catholic Church. He has been trying his best to lead the church to a more modern and up-to-date place.

He speaks openly about his acceptance of homosexuality and his understanding of why abortions can sometimes be necessary, but his most recent comment will put one of the strictest rules of the Catholic Church into question.

In an interview, Francis said he is considering letting married men become ordained priests. He said this new rule would be quite beneficial to rural areas that have very few priests. Right now, he knows he will not be completely removing the rule of celibacy.

There has been a growing issue of getting young people to fully commit to a vocation to the Church, and so this is why Francis is open to changing such strict rules.

This new type of priest would be called  a “viri probati,” which comes from the Latin meaning “man that is proven.”

The Associated Press did the original article about the statement from Francis. TIME magazine then did an article covering this topic. I think they could have down more news media coverage on this topic targeting the youth, but also it is a sensitive subject since it does deal with religion.

So with that taken into consideration, I feel they did a fare amount of coverage on this sort of topic.

Hackathon focuses on abortion rights

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By ISABELLA HALILI

Hackathons are usually held as competitions to see what developers can create the newest and best app, but this weekend it’s a for a much greater cause.

More than 300 developers and activists will come together at the Abortion Access Hackathon. It is a two-day coding marathon in San Francisco that is aiming to find technology-based solutions to support women’s health care providers who fear the new decisions under the Trump Administration.

The organizers of this event have no set game plan, but are thinking of creating an app that educates people on abortion access laws in their state or developing an Uber-like app that will drive women who need it to abortion clinics.

Many abortion providers have financial support, but lack basic operational tools, such as data management and cybersecurity. This event is crucial so to help abortion providers with these issues, but to also shine light on the more relevant issue of Republicans in Congress initiating the defunding of Planned Parenthood.

Although this event is only taking place in California, organizers hope the ideas that come out of this event spread across the country, especially to states that have stricter abortion laws.

A number of women’s health blogs and online magazines have covered this event idea in the past week. TIME also wrote an article discussing the importance of this event. It was smart of the Los Angeles Times to write about this event as well, since it is taking place in California. Teen Vogue is trying to get the young adults more active in political issues by publishing an article about this hackathon as well.

I think there was a wide variety of audiences that were reached with all these different publications and all did a great job on getting the public more involved with political matters.

London protests travel ban at film

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By VERONICA SPAGNA

London decides to show the world that, as a city, it does not just tolerates diversity, it celebrates it.

In Central London last Sunday, on the night of the Oscars, thousands of people attended the screening of the award-winning movie “The Salesman” to show support to its Iranian director, Asghar Farhadi. Farhadi had announced that he would boycott the ceremony in response to Donald Trump’s travel ban.

We should all be at least a little familiar with Donald Trump’s travel ban, which was announced in January. The president signed an executive order temporarily banning the entry of citizens and immigrants from Iran, Syria, Iraq, Sudan, Libya, Yemen and Tahardi.

In response to this travel ban, the Iranian director Asghar Farhadi told The New York Times in January that he would not attend the Oscars even if granted exception to enter the country, and stayed true to his words.

Asghar Farhardi’s movie, “The Salesman,” was nominated for best Foreign-Language Film at the 89th Academy Awards and won the Oscar hours after the screening in London.

To show unity and support for Asghar Fahardi, some well known actors and producers organized a premiere of the movie and collaborated with Sadie Khan, the mayor of London to premiere the nominated film for free in Trafalgar Square, one of London’s most important destinations.

This event was a peaceful protest, that showed that London did not agree with what Donald Trump believed in, how the focus should be on welcoming people and not banning them. I think it is beautiful how people are uniting together to share the message of acceptance, and not in violent protests or holding signs criticizing whats wrong.

Around 10,000 people showed up at the premiere of the “The Salesman,” which was occurring a few hours before the Oscars.

The Iranian director was not present at the screening, but spoke to the crowd through a recorded video of him. In the video, he apologized for not being there and said he was there in spirit. He additionally made a speech about how we are all citizens of the world and that we need to stay united.

Fahardi was not present at the Oscars, so he sent two Iranian-Americans to claim his award. Anousheh Ansari, the first female Iranian to go into space, claimed the award for Fahardi and read a speech written by him. Fahardi criticized the travel ban and called it inhumane. He apologized for not being at the ceremony, but how it was  out of respect for the people of his country.

In his speech he also stated that “Dividing the world into the “us “ and “our enemies” categories creates fear, a deceitful justification for aggression and war.” Which I think is a very eye opening statement and was quoted on numerous articles on the event.

Many Journalists covered this event, highlighting and focusing on the speeches given by at the screening and the Oscars. The focus of these peaceful and powerful words puts into good light the event. Although I do feel like journalists should also focus on covering the reactions of Americans, focus on covering on how America has reacted to this peaceful and powerful protest.

I think that the extent to which London and its citizens have gone to prove a point is very inspirational. By being united together in fighting for their rights and the rights of people in other countries is quite admirable.

This protest gave a stronger message in the simplicity of attending a movie screening than in protests that could lead to disturbance with the use of negativity. I think the world is slowly progressing to stronger unification by the day and protests like these show the importance of respect in humanity.

Love your curves? What curves?

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By ALISON GOEBEL

The very popular store, Zara, has been criticized for skinny models being the centerpiece of its new “Curves” campaign.

Zara’s message seemed harmless, urging women to “love your curves,” but the body-positive message was featured by very slender models.

There was nothing wrong with how they looked or anything against the model’s bodies, but it was the fact that the campaign was to love your curves and these women had little to none of the sort.

Zara has stores all over the world and describes itself as one of the largest international fashion companies.

It’s ironic that this story is so big because I was online shopping on Zara exactly 12 hours ago and I remember thinking that all of the models didn’t really have any curves and were extremely skinny, just a mental note to myself.

The fact that the Zara campaign was to “love your curves,” but none of the models had any was a little bothersome and, for me personally, it rubbed me the wrong way as well as millions of other people across the globe.

This article was spread over pretty much every large news organization you can think of, and it should be.

The news organizations did a very good job covering this because Zara is a huge brand and their message didn’t resonate well with a lot of people, so I believe it was crucial for them to cover a story like this.

Another reason why I think a lot of news organizations covered this story was because of body image and the new “curvy” trend.

Writing about something like this gives them attention and pulls in readers because of the delicate topic of what exactly is beautiful and should we be advertising women that are 110 pounds and an unhealthy-skinny?

This is a very big deal in not only the fashion and modeling world, but in the world as a whole.

Society really does a grand job at painting a picture of what you should look like, that being most of the time you’re not skinny enough, you don’t have a thigh gap, you can’t see your ribs, and heaven forbid you have a teeny bit of fat under your belly button.

Companies and advertisers throw in your face of what ‘beautiful’ is or what your body should look like, and guess what, we all fall for it.

We are going through a massive shift in society right now where curvy is the new beautiful and slowly getting away from the stick thin look.

Zara attempted to go with the new trend of curvy is sexy, but this new campaign did more bad than good.

Debate over court storming returns

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By JIHAD SHATARA

Court storming has been a trending topic on college campuses and in the national news media as of late.

Storming the field or court has been a long-lasting tradition after “upsetting” a high ranking team. After Miami beat Duke on Saturday, many people criticized the university saying it was too dangerous. Web sites like “State of the U” came out saying “who cares, they’re college kids.” Everyone seems to have an opinion on this matter.

In 2014, Sportscenter did a piece on how court storming in college basketball was affecting how schools bolstered security. It even showed a clip of Coach K at Duke stopping kids from running on the court after a huge win against archrival North Carolina.

Sportscenter proceeded to show more clips of court storming gone wrong. More news media outlets showed kids falling out of wheelchairs, cheerleaders getting trampled and even players were getting injured. The argument lives on and is carried by the news media simply due to the fact that it is dangerous and could result in serious injury, and the school could be liable.

The news media are hot on this debate. Many will argue let kids enjoy college. Many will argue how dangerous it is. But this is a topic I do not see losing steam any time soon.